The president of the Central Bank of Brazil, Roberto Campos Neto, officially declared that the “digital real” pilot project will “start right away” and that it should interact with PIX, the BC’s hugely successful digital payment system.
The statements were made during a presentation at the BTG Pactual CEO Conference 2023.
However, Campos Neto did not define the launch date.
At the event, Campos Neto reinforced that the digital real will be a digital currency issued by the central bank (CBDC – Central Bank Digital Currency) for wholesale, i.e., for companies, and that the population will have contact with the CBDC via digital deposits in institutions approved by the Central Bank.
According to him, “banks will start to have more digitalization on their balance sheets”.
The digital real is an alternative currency with the same value as traditional money.
The difference is that it cannot be converted into banknotes.
This money is made up of only digital codes, indicating its value.
It is also not a cryptocurrency, which is a private currency, has an investment characteristic, and is not regulated by the Central Bank.
Campos Neto, who is expected to finish his term at the Central Bank at the end of 2023, also stated that he intends to leave office having accomplished some of the Central Bank’s main goals, such as integrating the Pix with the “digital real.”
Ten days ago, on TV Cultura’s Roda Viva program, he had also stated that the “real digital” is a priority.
“In the digital world, we have three big blocks I would like to connect: the PIX, the Open Finance, and the digital currency. We already have the digital currency pilot, which will start running soon,” he declared in that interview.
“I think these three things can change Brazil’s financial intermediation history, transforming our system into something efficient. No one in the world is so advanced today,” he concluded.
Although he guaranteed that the Digital Real is not the total death of physical money, he pointed out that one of the purposes of the CBDC is to reduce the circulation of paper money.
According to the Central Bank, only 3% of the money available for operation in the country is in paper form.
With information from Revista Oeste